Shawn Ryan on the likelihood of a revival of The Shield

Last Updated on July 31, 2021

Over the past few years we've had our fair share of revivals of once popular television programs, ranging from Gilmore Girls to The X-Files, but the revival trend isn't over yet and we've got plenty more on the horizon. Some of these resurrections have proved to be worthy, while others wound up as a disappointing footnote in the serie's history. Even so, there are still plenty of shows which audiences would love to see back on television, even if they wouldn't necessarily have anything new to say. Ah, nostalgia.

One of the best shows of the past twenty years, in my opinion at least, was The Shield, a crime drama centered around Detective Vic Mackey, the leader of a four-man anti-gang unit known as the Strike Team. Vic and his buddies weren't above using whatever means it took in order to keep peace on the streets, all while making a little profit on the side for themselves. The Shield aired for seven seasons on FX (2002-08) and actually managed to craft a finale which is frequently counted as one of the best of all-time. The series recently celebrated its fifteenth anniversary and Entertainment Weekly asked Shield creator Shawn Ryan what his thoughts on revisiting the series were.

It’s interesting, Jay Karnes and Michael Chiklis were over at our house [Ryan’s wife Cathy Cahlin Ryan played Vic’s ex-wife Corrine] a week ago, so it turned into a lot of reminiscing. We’ve all sort of worked and we’ve all enjoyed things we’ve done, but The Shield was a singular pleasure to do. To me, it’s hard not to want to recapture that feeling we all had when we were making the show. But nostalgia is a tricky thing. You’d also like the feel the nostalgia of being back in college or when you first feel in love with your wife. I was reading an interview with Joss Whedon about the 20th anniversary of Buffy, and he addressed this a little bit and I agree — you can’t recreate the time and experience of first seeing it.

I’m of two minds: Something that would bring me back to all those friends, feelings, and the freedom we had making the show — I would love. I do think the ending is such a high bar and I would only come back if I thought we could beat that or exceed that, and I honestly don’t know if we could. Artistically, I’m in the camp of leaving it there. Personally, to get a chance to work with Michael, Walton, C.C.H., Jay, Cathy, Catherine, and everyone would be amazing. We really did all love each other and we loved doing that show…

There was a time a few years after The Shield ended, where I was having some talks with Fox’s movie division about something Shield-related. I had a pitch and what intrigued me about that pitch is that for the first 30 to 40 minutes of the movie, you wouldn’t meet anyone from The Shield universe. Then, at a certain point, Vic Mackey comes in to the main character’s world. That to me at least felt like I wasn’t just trying to make two more episodes of The Shield, it felt like something new and different that could stand on its own and wouldn’t detract from the show’s legacy. For various reasons, that never happened and now, any momentum for that is probably gone. I never want to close the door to it continuing in some way, but I never want to give unnecessary hope to the fans. I don’t know what the future holds. I’ve never definitively decided what Vic Mackey is doing now. As a fan of The Shield, I am interested in seeing that.

Although it doesn't seem like Ryan has completely closed the door on Vic Mackey, he also sounds like he's perfectly willing to leave well enough alone. Not every series gets to go out on top, and The Shield certainly did that, so why run the risk of spoiling a damn near perfect run. Timeless, Shawn Ryan's latest series, recently wrapped up its first season on NBC. Ryan co-created Timeless with Eric Kripke (Supernatural) and the series follows an unlikely team who travel though time to save the future from a man bent on destroying the past as we know it.

Although it doesn't sound likely, would you be down for a revival of The Shield?